EDITORIAL: Mystery over Mack's status violates our rights

Trenton Mayor Tony Mack has been indicted on federal charges. This is not news to anyone in this capital city.

Mack has pleaded not guilty to six counts in an alleged scheme to accept $119,000 in bribes in exchange for using his influence over the development of a parking garage on city-owned land.

Again, we know this. Old news, right?

We know this because it’s a public record. We know this because the citizens have a right to know if their mayor is accused of corruption charges.

The complaint against Mack, the charges, the arrest reports, etc., are all public records. You can ask for them just as easily as we can.

Those documents belong to you. You paid for them.

Mack’s bail agreement is another public record. On this document, it states that the mayor’s travel is restricted to New Jersey.

According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Mack has the right to appeal Pretrial Services for a waiver of this restriction, something he would have had to do before he rode the rails down to DC for the U.S. Mayor’s Convention and the inauguration.

But we — and we’re including you on this — are in the dark as to whether that permission was secured.

Mack is happily flaunting his presence in Washington, representing a city that by and large wants nothing to do with him these days. One has to assume based on pure common sense that he would never just blatantly defy federal authorities so conspicuously if he knew that being put in jail was a certainty when he returns.

Would he?We’ll never know, it seems, because Pretrial Services — an arm of the government that we all pay taxes to support — does not have to talk to the media or anyone else, apparently. That office does not even have a media contact, and representatives of Pretrial Services have made it clear they will say nothing.

But the question remains: if Mack’s bail agreement is a public record, then why would any amendment or addendum to that document that drastically changes its terms not also be public?

While Mack is living it up in Washington with the elite, why are we left to wonder if he’s legally allowed to be there? It’s a simple question. Further, don’t we have the right to know whether he is there on the city’s dime?

Again, it’s an easy yes or no question. Lawyers on both sides of this case claim they have no idea where Mack is or what permissions he has. It’s hard to believe that they are that ill-informed about their client or suspect, respectively.

Either way, we all have a right to know, and that right is being denied.